Return with us now to those lazy, carefree days
of 1977, when giant behemoths like Led Zeppelin ruled the earth, and bloated
concert films like "The Song Remains The Same" ruled midnight movie
houses.

"The Song Remains The Same" is both an entertaining and frustrating
disc. Entertaining because it's just about the only widely available concert
footage of a hugely popular rock group, and frustrating because it's such a
clunky film.

Led Zep had a camera crew follow them around on their 1972 tour, one which
smashed many box-office records, and found
them playing some of their most popular music. Many of the introductory
"getting off the private plane and driving to the arena" shots in
"TSRTS" come from when Zeppelin 1972 Pittsburgh gig, but the onstage footage
was shot over three nights at New York's Madison Square Garden.

(Or at least most of it does. One Web site, which sounded very informative,
regarded "TSRTS", claims that some of the concert footage was reshot
a few years after the 1972 MSG concerts in an otherwise empty concert hall, to
provide additional footage, such as close ups and better camera angles).

The visual quality of the concert footage,
shot in 35mm, is by far the best available visual documentary of a Led Zeppelin
concert. And while the sound is uniformly excellent, the MSG concerts were near
the end of 1972 tour, and the band has always claimed that these weren't the
most inspired nights it had. If you are a die-hard Led Zep fan (as I, and many
other redblooded American teenagers were <G>) you might notice the
performances *are* a little flat, at least as compared the recently released
BBC Concerts. Disc Two of the BBC CDs covers similar territory as this concert.

Because there were gaps in the concert footage, and because the band admirably
wanted to go beyond the standard "Woodstock" and "Monterey
Pop"-type concert films, Led Zep decided to cover them up with
"fantasy sequences", where each member dreamed up a visual sequence
to accompany selected songs. While their intentions were admirable, their
execution left much to be desired. However, these clunky fantasy sequences were
as a precursor and inspiration to MTV videos of the heavy metal bands of the
1980s. Unfortunately, they look very dated today.

First, there's bassist and keyboard player John Paul Jones' "midnight
highwayman" sequence, overlaid on top of an excellent Jimmy Page guitar
solo during the extended instrumental break of "No Quarter".

This is followed by Robert Plant's extended "hippie Dungeons &
Dragons" bit, where he sails a ship like a psychedelic Erik
the Red, eats a wild mushroom, then rescues a blond maiden imprisoned in a
castle. The music during this is the title
track, and "The Rain Song", both of which feature excellent playing
by Jimmy Page on his 6 & 12 string double necked
Gibson.

Jimmy Page's fantasy sequence may be the best
of all. It's certainly the most symbolic, as he climbs a mountain during a full
moon, then sees himself age from embryo to old man and back again. Page is a
follower of the demonic Alester Crowley, an expert mountain climber (even going
so far as to buy Crowley's house overlooking Loc Ness, where Page's scenes were
filmed). The music underneath this is Page's solo where he plays his Les Paul
electric guitar with a violin bow (this is the inspiration for the hilarious
bit in "Spinal Tap", where Nigel Tufnel plays his Les Paul with a
*violin*), the centerpiece of "Dazed & Confused", pages 28 minute
long guitar tour-de-force.

Drummer John Bonham's scenes overlaid on top of his endless "Moby
Dick" sequences were are by far the most
straightforward, as they show Bonham not in any swords and sorcery or
mysticism, but doing the things he loved best: racing motorcycles and hot rods,
playing billiards, and spending time with his wife and son (Jason, who would
later grow up to be a talented drummer in his own right).

The fantasy sequences at least fit in with Zeppelin's mystical and occasionally
medieval image. Interspersed throughout the film are ugly real-life vignettes,
with Peter Grant, Zep's foul-mouthed, suomo wrestler-sized manager accusing a
concert promoter of ripping off the band (just before they launch into the
title song), security guards armed with billy-clubs chasing a drugged-out fan
through backstage hallways, and lots of assorted shots of Led Zep's spaced out
fans and groupies. There's also some television news footage the robbery of
Zep's hotel safe deposit box to the tune of about $200,000, spliced into scenes
of the band playing "Heartbreaker".

The implicit message in all of these New
York-vignettes, in between the fantasy and opening sequences shot on the band's
bucolic English mansions and farms is that Led Zep lives in a Valhalla-like
atmosphere, and occasionally deigns to visit the teenage peons in America,
cannon-fodder males who live in urban slums, and lead lives of moronic
desperation, saved occasionally by their communes with Led Zeppelin in vast
"Houses of the Holy" (Plant's description of the sports arenas like
Madison Square Garden that Zep played in, and the title of the album that
Zeppelin was promoting when these concert scenes were shot). I don't
think that's the message that Zeppelin conciously wanted to leave their fans
with (it wasn't until the punk revolution of the late 1970s, just around the
corner when this film was made, that bands started *explicitly* to insult and
berate their fans.), yet unfortunately, because the band, or their directors,
decided to intersperse these typical "rocumentary" scenes in a film
that they had no business being in.

Image's recently released LD of "The Song Remains The Same" is a big
improvement over previous LD and VHS version of the film. This is the first
time it's been letterboxed, and while that doesn't make all that much
difference, the compositions *do* look better framed, with a bit more visual
information. Also, there will be less cut off when this film is viewed on 16X9
television sets.

The disc has digital pro-logic surround sound,
with a terrific surround sound sequence just before Page's before mentioned
fantasy sequence. He bangs out a number of staccato power chords with his
violin-bow, which go left, center, right, behind, left, center, right, behind,
in quick succession. The sound on this sequence was originally screwed-up, so
that it sounded like left, center, right, muffled noise, left, center, right,
muffled noise, something that even Page complained about in an interview when
he saw the first VHS version of TSRTS.

Also, a number of poor splices, where a frame or two of the film was missing,
which caused the music to hiccup, have been replaced, so that the music flows
*much* better than it did before.

The disc has chapter stops between most songs, which makes jumping past the
long, boring opening scenes easy, although there could have been a lot more
chapters added. I would have liked to have seen chapter stops before and
after the violin solo during the 28 minute long "Dazed and Confused",
and there's no excuse for not having a chapter stop between
"Heartbreaker" and "Whole Lot of Love"

As I said near the beginning, "The Song Remains The Same" is still
the best live footage that exists, and for many people, the only chance of
seeing Led Zeppelin performing live. I saw it numerous times after the group
had broken up in the early 80s, when it played to midnight movie halls that
reeked of cannabis. My best friend and I, both in our late teens and
guitar players for a couple of years, walked out of our first showing and said
"man, we better practice a helluva lot more!" I imagine this disc could
start a whole new round of guitar hero worship. [grin]

If you're a fan of the Led Zeppelin, or at least the hard-rock genre, you'll
have a lot of fun with this new disc. If heavy rock isn't your cup of
tea, then you'll probably watch this disc and wonder what all the fuss is
about.